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Your favourite acting performances


Murtz

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Posted

I watched Gangs of New York for the umpteenth time last night, and my opinion on Daniel Day Lewis giving one of the best acting performances I've ever seen still remains. He just gripped me with every part of it throughout the film.

 

In my opinion.. I don't think ive seen a performance that gets even close.

 

What's yours?

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Posted

Scott Cohen as Wolf in the TV mini-series The 10th Kingdom. Really plays that role amazingly well, and is perhaps the highlight of the show from start to finish.

Posted

First of all, if anyone says Heath Ledger as Joker they need to re-watch Jack Nicholson's performance and reconsider.

 

Scott Cohen as Wolf in the TV mini-series The 10th Kingdom. Really plays that role amazingly well, and is perhaps the highlight of the show from start to finish.

 

Great shout, that. From TV the other one that immediately springs to mind is T-Bag from Prison Break. Utterly believable as a ruthless pervert/paedo scumbag.

 

Overall though, Anthony Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs is arguably the ultimate performance by any actor.

 

Honourable mentions:

Christian Bale - American Psycho, The Prestige

Woody Harrelson - Natural Born Killers, The People vs Larry Flynt

Edward Norton - American History X

Posted
First of all, if anyone says Heath Ledger as Joker they need to re-watch Jack Nicholson's performance and reconsider.

 

 

LaGoosh is going to go through you for that.

 

Yeah, this thread is going to upset me.

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Posted
Paddy Considine in Dead Man's Shoes.

 

"YOU, YA CUNT!"

 

I shit myself.

 

Green's mention of Baldwin in Glengarry Glen Ross was a good one but that was more a cameo than anything.

 

I love Orson Welles in Touch Of Evil, he is a completely perfect bastard in that. Also, on a completely different track, the little girl in the Korean horror film Phone puts in THE best child acting performance I've ever seen. Even if you don't like the film that much, just watch it for her, she's unbelievable.

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Posted
First of all, if anyone says Heath Ledger as Joker they need to re-watch Jack Nicholson's performance and reconsider.

 

 

LaGoosh is going to go through you for that.

 

Yeah, this thread is going to upset me.

 

Darn tooting I am!

 

Jack Nicholson as The Joker isn't really Jack Nicholson performing a character. He's just doing crazy Jack Nicholson which he's done a million times. There's no real character there, it's impossible to believe that this guy is actually The Joker, he's just Jack Nicholson wearing makeup dancing around to Prince and spray painting pieces of art like a twat. Heath Ledger completely disappears into the role to the point that the actor is completely unrecognisable, all that remains is the character. It's impossible to say that Jack Nicholson did the same, he's just being Jack fucking Nicholson.

 

Here's a couple of mine:

 

Javier Bardem in No Country For Old Men

Clint Eastwood in Unforgiven

 

And Terry O'Quinn, Michael Emerson and Matthew Fox all did spectacular work on Lost.

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Posted

Before this thread degenerates into another boring discussion about Batman, I would say that I reckon that comedy performances largely get ignored when it comes to doling out acting accolades. To that end, these are amazing and well worth checking out:-

 

* Charles Grodin in Midnight Run -

 

* Gene Wilder in Blazing Saddles -

 

* Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant in His Girl Friday - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrMcNk3MUgs

 

* Anne Ramsey in Throw Momma From The Train - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjhS5meZcEk

 

* Eddie Murphy in Beverly Hills Cop - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quWQHvefbUc

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Posted

Peter Cushing - The Hound of the Baskervilles. The first acting performance that had me more interested in the actor than the role. I was a big Sherlock Holmes fan as a kid, and Cushing was just fucking incredible. He's also great in Frankenstein. Mark Gatiss gave a lovely tribute to him in his series on horror recently.

 

Jack Nicholson - Chinatown. It takes a fantastic fucking actor to beat the shit out of a victim and keep you on his side. Jake is an asshole, but he's not a bastard, and it's a difficult role.

 

Sylvester Stallone - Rocky. I'm deadly serious, too. In the first and the last films particularly, Stallone's performance is so complete and believable.

 

Conrad Veidt - Casablanca. This is partially here just because Conrad Veidt is a fucking badass and deserves to be remembered so much more than he is. Not only did he play a great villain in this, but he was also the somnambulist in 'The Cabinet of Dr Caligari' which makes him one of the very first, most influential film monsters in movie history. And he performed in one of the first gay-rights movies ever made, back when it was seriously illegal. And he was targeted for assassination by the fucking Nazis, which is why he left for America. And, on top of all that? He was the direct inspiration for The Joker. Here, he's a great villain in one of the greatest movies ever made. It only becomes more of a joy to watch over time.

 

Nigel Bruce - Dr Watson in the Basil Rathbone Sherlock Holmes movies. Still think Watson is a bungler? This performance is why. Bruce plays the ultimate well-intentioned old duffer. You can see exactly where each scene he's in is going to go, and his performance keeps you watching regardless because he does it so well.

 

Al Pacino - The Godfather. Talk about a journey in this movie. Jesus. What a performance.

 

Jeff Bridges - The Big Lebowski. What a career reinvention. Unrecognisable and brilliant from beginning to end.

 

Robert Carlyle - Cracker. Yeah, it's TV, but that's not prohibited as far as I can see. Carlyle was a fucking revelation in this, and it's still one of the most intense performances I've ever seen anywhere. Ever.

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